The Dart made a tight turn and angled in to land on just the nib of the runway. Its tires chirped on the first bounce before it settled into a sedate taxi. The four-bladed main rotor lost momentum as the aircraft slowed. Finding a convenient spot near us, Grandpa Walker killed the engines and climbed out. Being a legacy that predated first contact with the Scya, he got out of wearing a standard-issue hero suit. Instead, he wore the more archaic ‘Mystery Man’ attire - double-breasted raincoat, fedora, black domino mask, shiny shoes. He moved with an imposing posture despite his rail-thin build. His short-cropped pale gray hair was all but hidden by his outfit, though the age lines writ upon his face were not.
Grandpa Walker was not the only person who climbed out of The Dart. He was followed by a youth who was probably in his early teens. Through the unzipped front of his white leather jacket, a red and blue hero suit was visible. He also had on black cargo pants and a red mask with blue goggles. His short, chestnut hair was mussed, probably from the flight. My guess was that it was normally kept in a preppy style.
Rookhound’s gaze passed over me and Donny, and he gave a disapproving shake of the head. I blinked in surprise. What had we done to disappoint him already?
“I hear you cried for help,” He said, turning to Dad.
Dad, for his part, retained enough composure to share the images of Bluebottle and outline the problem overall. “In short, there are more entities running around than we can contain on our own. Assistance is appreciated.”
“All right. Until we have a native flier on the scene, I will focus on tracking down this Bluebottle,” Rookhound said. “You can turn your focus on one of the other entities.”
“Fine by me,” Dad said. With that, the reunion was over. Grandpa Walker returned to The Dart, and Dad went back to the SUV. Grandpa Walker never introduced his new sidekick, or even said word one to his grandsons. There were plenty of options that didn’t give away anything private. I tried to tell myself that he wanted to stay on-task, but part of me knew that was just an excuse.
“We’ll have a better chance of finding Adamantaphrax,” Tekton said. “Because I can hit that one with a locator spell. The other one, we don’t even have a name for.”
“Do it,” Dad said.
Our eyes widened as Tekton’s finger jabbed down on the map at Fort Garriot.
“How fast do these things move?” Donny asked.
“We know nothing about Adamantaphrax,” Dad said.
“Well, according to Gottfried Witchbane, Adamantaphrax was a martial spirit,” Tekton said. “I’m guessing Fort Garriot is closer to Pigeonpot than Fort Adder.”
“Am I the only one getting a bad feeling about this one?” I asked. “After the hard time a spirit of pestilence gave us, I’d feel better if we had more heavies going after this one.”
“We can make all the guesses we want, but we still need hard facts,” Dad said. “That means laying eyes on this thing.” He started up the engine, and we buckled in. Driving back out of Garriot Field, we headed back down the road to the Fort gate. As we pulled into the drive, a sentry in green-gray fatigues stepped from the guard shack. The man looked stunningly bored. Watching over a storage facility had to have that effect. Dad presented his BHA card. The soldier looked over the blue piece of plastic with a raised eyebrow. I doubt he’d ever seen a hero license before, most people hadn’t. “Has there been anything out of the ordinary on base recently?” Dad asked.
“Other than a truck full of tights pulling up to the gate?” the soldier asked.
“We’re trying to contain a group of dangerous creatures. One of which is in this immediate vicinity.”
“What does it look like?”
“We don’t know,” Dad said. “We haven’t caught sight of this one.”
“Then how do you know it’s here?”
“Ever been hunting?”
“Of course.”
“Then you know it’s entirely possible to track something without seeing it directly,” Dad said. “This one falls into the category of very abnormal creatures, so I can’t give you a description until we catch up to it. We just know that it is in or around Fort Garriot.”
“Good luck in finding it, but I can’t let you inside.”
“Can you at least call your base commander?” Dad asked.
“Hell no, I’m not calling the Colonel.”
Dad woke his phone and called Shiva again. “No new updates,” Shiva said.
“I appreciate the information, Shiva, but I called to make a new request. Could you get me the number for the Fort Garriot base commander?”
“Working,” Shiva said. “Do you want the number, or do you want me to connect you?”
The gate sentry had a skeptical look on his face.
“If you could connect me, I would appreciate it.”
“Working,” Shiva said. A moment later, the ‘other end is ringing’ sound came on the line.
“Colonel Otten,” A new voice said.
“Colonel, this is Razordemon. I am a Regional Coordinator for the Community Fund and a Class One Licensed Hero. I have been tracking highly dangerous creatures across central Alabama. One of these is currently in the vicinity of Fort Garriot.”
“Probably inside the perimeter,” Tekton cut in.
“I have been stopped by your gate sentry, who is sticking to the parameters of his duties quite admirably. I would like to request your assistance in tracking this thing down.”
“What sort of bullshit is this?” Otten asked.
“If you want to verify what I’m saying, the Bureau of Hero Affairs has a contact number to verify license numbers. If you think this is a prank call, you could always contact your gate guard. He’s standing outside my window.” Dad’s phone went dark as the Colonel hung up. I wasn’t sure if that was a bad sign. A phone in the sentry box rang, and the soldier stepped inside the answer it. I couldn’t hear what was said. The soldier came back out.
“The Colonel is on his way here,” he said.
Colonel Otten had the look of a man who knew his career had hit a dead end. His hair and uniform were still mil-spec, kept up through long habit, but his expression and mien betrayed him. His face was long and drawn, sad gray eyes peering out at us. Commander of a mothballed storage facility had to have few prospects for further advancement. “You’re the one who called himself Razordemon?” the Colonel asked. Dad presented his BHA card again.
“Yes,” he said.
“What makes you think I’m going to let you through my gate?” Otten asked.
“It’s either that, or you can go chase this thing down yourself. Mind you, a less martial version gave three licensed heroes a run for our money. We’d have a better chance if we cooperated.” Peering into the car, Otten sized us up. His gaze stopped when he spied the stump that was Tekton’s left leg.
“Where exactly did you say this thing was?”
“We only managed to track it to the Fort,” Dad said. “Until we can conduct a search, we can’t narrow it down further.”
Before Otten could speak again, his cell rang. He turned away from the car and answered it. “Colonel Otten. A what? Where?” He mouthed a profanity, but didn’t give it voice. “I see.” He hung up and turned back. “We may have spotted your creature by the east perimeter.” Distant shots rang out, followed by a report not unlike that of a cannon. Chasing these sounds was the chirrup of a klaxon. “Open the gate, let them in,” Otten said. The sentry nodded and hit a button that withdrew the gate. “Follow me,” the Colonel said, climbing into an olive drab car parked nearby.
We followed the Colonel around towards the eastern edge of the base, past cryptically labeled buildings. We pulled to a stop at the sight of two soldiers dragging a third along the roadway. The third soldier was holding his midsection, from which an ominous amount o
f red had leaked. As we stepped out to render aid, the sickly groan of a gas alarm sent goosebumps up my arms.
“That’s not our alarm,” Otten said, raising his voice to be heard over the groan and the more electronic chirruping of the klaxon.
“It’s the intruder,” one of the soldiers said. “It’s making that noise.”
With the clanking of thick metal on thick metal and the hiss of pneumatics, a figure slowly trod out from behind one of the buildings. Each step of its hobnailed jackboots pressed mud out of nothingness and left a mark around the edges of its footprint. It wore a tattered gray greatcoat that was splattered with mud and blood, torn by bullet holes and shrapnel. Its head was capped with a German sallet, the archaic predecessor of the Stahlhelm. Under it was fitted a gas mask with a hose that hung like a proboscis down to a filter can. A burning red glow emanated from the slits in the helmet.
Its breastplate was formed from angular plate steel, bolted and riveted together. It reminded me of the armor on early tanks. From the ripped lower edges of its trouser legs and the torn, necrotic flesh there emerged a pair of pistons which vanished into its boots. Its arms did not end in hands, but were instead fused at the wrists to the grips of weapons. The right was attached around the wooden grip of a bolt action rifle whose sword bayonet jutted out sharply. The left coiled around the metal haft of a spear or glaive slightly taller than it was.
Barbed wire coiled around its limbs and torso, trailing behind it, though failing to impede its movements. Tawny vapors wafted from its body, carried along by the breeze. They smelled vaguely of horseradish and garlic.
“Fall back!” Dad called out.
“What?” Otten asked.
“That thing’s fuming mustard gas.” Dad helped the soldiers pulled their wounded comrade into the back seat of the Colonel’s car. “We need to keep our distance.” With the sickening groan of a gas alarm, the tawny cloud thickened and wafted off its body. Adamantaphrax took another step forward. It raised its rifle and deliberately aimed for the wall next to us. With a cannon-like retort, it shot the hardened concrete, spraying all of us with fragments. The hole smashed into the hardened concrete was more in line with the noise it made than the bore of the rifle. Free from any operating hands, the bolt action operated itself. A brass cartridge case larger than the weapon could have fired dropped to the pavement with a clang.
Another of the soldiers was bleeding from a fragment wound, and Otten maneuvered him into the car. We beat a hasty retreat from Adamantaphrax’s line of fire.
“What is that thing?” Otten called from his open window.
“Looks like a spirit of industrial war,” Tekton said.
“How can that be?” Dad asked. “These things were captured in the fifteen hundreds.”
“But Adamantaphrax’s jar was cracked during the first world war. Even if it couldn’t escape, it would have soaked in all that horror and been remolded by it.”
“What’s all this talk about spirits?” Otten asked.
“Whatever its nature or origins, there’s something there that we need to recapture,” Dad said.
“Capture nothing, we should just kill it,” Otten said. His eyes widened slightly with fright as the gas alarm sound came from behind us. Adamantaphrax emerged from around a corner it could not possibly have reached at its slow walking pace. “How many of these things are there?”
“As far as we know, just the one,” Dad kicked the SUV into drive and pulled up to where we’d previously seen the creature. Its muddy footprints stopped in the middle of the road. “What do you think?” he asked, turning to Tekton.
“It’s definitely teleporting,” Tekton said. With a cannon retort, our left rear tire was torn from the SUV and our undercarriage struck the pavement. We ditched the vehicle immediately, with Donny and I hauling Tekton out of the passenger seat. Gunshots rang off of Adamantaphrax’s metallic shell as the uninjured soldier in Otten’s car tried to hurt it.
“Clear the area! Fall back and regroup,” Dad called, moving for cover.
“We need heavier ordinance,” Otten said. “Anti-tank missiles, maybe.”
“Do you think it will help?” I asked.
“Where’s your response team?” Tekton asked.
“Full staff here is fifty people. We’re guarding a bunch of boxes,” Otten said.
“And they’re led by a Colonel because?” Donny asked.
“It’s still a Fort.”
We scattered again as the smell of horseradish started to tickle my nostrils. I held my breath as we ran. The last thing I wanted to do was get a lungful of mustard gas. The analytical part of my brain laughed at me, dredging up the fact that mustard gas was a blister agent. It didn’t have to be breathed in to do awful things.
Part 5
“We need a better strategy than ‘find spirit so we can run away from it,’” Dad said. His phone sat on the hood of Otten’s car. I wasn’t sure if Adamantaphrax had lost interest in us, but it hadn’t pursued us into the medical center, or even under the awning of its car port. I looked at the large red cross painted on the side of the building and wondered if Adamantaphrax was obeying some version of the rules of war. It was certainly ignoring the prohibition on chemical weapons though.
“Has Tekton gotten the opportunity to attempt an entrapment?” Minispell’s voice was rendered tinny by the speakerphone. The sorceress was on maternity leave, but that did not preclude a consultation. She wasn’t even close to giving birth, but everyone seemed to be in agreement that magic and the unborn were a bad mix.
“My limited mobility is making that difficult,” Tekton said.
“You seem awfully calm for a guy who’s lost a leg,” Otten said.
“I’ve got magic to grow it back, it just takes a few weeks.”
“Back on topic,” Dad said. “The logistical difficulty involved in Tekton performing that task makes it unlikely we’ll be able to pull it off. What alternate options are there?”
“If Tekton is not an option, you need to bring in another magic user,” Minispell said. “It’s going to be either wait a few hours to fly one in, or...”
“Or what?” Otten asked.
“Or you could get one faster by borrowing one from Rockstead.”
“The only magic users at Rockstead are inmates,” Dad said. “Getting permission to take one out of their cell would take longer than flying in a fund member.”
“It’s give or take eight hundred miles from New Port Arthur to Fort Garriot,” Minispell said. “That’s about three hours by helicopter.”
“Has anyone left already? I called for aid a while ago.”
“Mister Thirty-Eight is on his way, in fact, he should be relatively close at this point. But he’s not going to be able to conduct a capture.”
“Still, a heavy hitter is not a bad thing to have either,” Dad said.
“We can send you Ixahau or Jester of Anubis, both are in New Port Arthur at the moment, and are the closest.”
“How about both, along with some support?” Dad asked.
“The helicopter we have our hands on only had four seats, counting the pilot.”
“If we can get a licensed hero in the pilot seat, that should maximize the benefit from the one flight,” Tekton said.
“You could wish for a teleport,” Minispell said. “Shiva’s showing me the roster on hand, and we don’t have any helicopter pilots with a hero license. Just civilian employees.”
“Fine, give the last seat to Miss Pain, she’s tactically versatile enough to be useful whatever the circumstance when they arrive,” Dad said.
“Understood. What are you going to do until then?”
“Keep them away from populated areas,” Dad said. “Try to mitigate the damage.”
“How?” I asked.
“Shiva, is there any
thing interesting in these boxes?” Dad asked.
“I was under the understanding that you did not wish me to access that information,” Shiva said. “Have you changed your mind?”
“That information is classified,” Otten said, “There’s no way in hell you have clearance to access it.”
“Do you?” Dad asked.
“Of course I do, I’m the base commander.”
“Then is there anything interesting we can make use of?”
“No,” Otten said. “Everything stored here has been disassembled, and we don’t store munitions. Those are kept at other facilities.”
“Is there anything else you need me for?” Minispell asked.
“Not at the moment,” Dad said.
“All right.” She hung up and Dad put his phone away.
“Given what we know now, you should probably leave me in the medical center,” Tekton said. “Unless you really want to push it and try for a capture now.”
“The jars are still in the SUV,” I said. Actually, it was more of a blurt as it dawned on me that we’d left them behind. Dad let out a long sigh.
“Do you at least have protective gear against chemical agents?” Dad asked, turning to Otten.
“In the armory, three blocks that way.” Otten pointed in the opposite direction of the car.
“We could...” Dad paused and looked up, peering around the overhang. “Wait a few minutes.” I followed his gaze and spotted a speck in the sky. I zoomed my eye in, and the speck resolved into a figure in green, white, and gold. His white cape fluttered behind him as he hurtled past. Dad called Shiva back. “Could you direct Mister Thirty-Eight to our frequency, he just overshot our position.”
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